FISHING AT HOME AND ABROAD 

 True, they can be sold, but I am not addressing these remarks to fish- 

 mongers. Better, perhaps, they can be given to the boatman to sell on his 

 own account, but he should be sufficiently paid without such perquisite. 

 A brief account of this ungainly style of murdering a sporting little fish 

 must be given, and something will then be said of more sportsmanlike 

 alternatives. True, the angler will catch fewer mackerel, but, since he is 

 fishing for fun and not for profit, he should enjoy catching each infinitely 

 more. The difference between these methods is not less than that between 

 ordinary lake fishing for trout and the Swiss manner of butchering them 

 in the Lake of Geneva on wire handlines armed with spoonbaits. 



The mackerel is so familiar a fish that we are apt to miss the beauty 

 of it as we do with other everyday objects. Yet for symmetry of outline 

 or gaiety of colouring it has few equals in its own class, and its speed and 

 gracefulness on the water are above praise. To appreciate the swimming 

 powers of this fish, they should not be judged from the lethargic move- 

 ments of the planetary mackerel that swim round and round the tank 

 of an aquarium, but should be studied in the sea. There are sunny 

 August days off Mevagissey on which I have watched hundreds of large 

 mackerel darting in every direction, two or three fathoms below the sur- 

 face, and gorging on brit and other small and helpless victims. Then it 

 is that one realizes the predatory nature of the mackerel and the elegant 

 lines on which it is modelled for high speed. If it only grew to ten or fiiteen 

 pounds in weight, few would need to go to America for their sea fishing, 

 and a mackerel of a pound will give as good a display on trout tackle 

 as a pollack of ten times the weight on the type of rod and line commonly 

 used for its capture. 



The success of railing for mackerel rests on the habit which these fish 

 have, particularly in the summer months, of chasing their food close 

 to the surface of the sea, where they dash with great fury after the sand- 

 eels and other fry. How many miles an hoiw a shoal of mackerel may cover 

 the distance I know not, but they swim fast enough to keep pace with a 

 boat sailing in a stiff breeze; and when mackerel are in this mood, any 

 small bright object trailed in front of them is almost sure to be taken. 

 Even if the man holding the line forgets to strike, the fish is, as a rule, 

 automatically hooked, so that, as will be seen, the element of skill is 

 wholly wanting, and he will catch the most fish, other conditions being 

 equal, who is quickest to haul in his line, remove the fish from the hook, 

 and send the bait astern again. This is exercise, but it is not skill. 

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